Extending Outdoor Mains Lighting

[Steve Wilkes]

I'm looking for some guidance regarding the extension of the circuit that feeds the couple of outdoor wall lamps I have on the back of my kitchen/extension to light the patio.

In a nutshell, I want to have four lights outside instead of the existing two. However, I (or in fact my wife!!) not only would like the new pair of lamps to be switched on with the original ones from the existing switch in the kitchen, but also would like to be able to independantly switch them off outside to leave just the original two on.

Initially, I thought the wiring would be straight forward afair to take a feed from each of the existing lamps (via a switch) to the new wall lamps, but having though about it and tried to sketch out the circuit, I'm not so sure...

Can anyone help me with the best way to go about this...

Thanks a lot

Steve

[Sparks]

I would do is...

Turn of mains!

Take a cable from one of the original lights to an outdoor switch, then from this switch take a cable to the first of the new lights, then to the other new one.

The switch will need to switch the live (red wire) just connect the two neutral wires together with some chock block in the back of the switch

Alternatively, run a single cable from one of the original lights, through the switch to the new lights, then carefully break into the wire, and only cut the live, strip back, and connect to the switch - this may not be practical though!

If the switch is a double pole, then you can switch both the live and the neutral!

Sparks...

[Steve Wilkes]

Thanks for this... much appreciated...

If I read it right then, the feed arriving at the existing light should be Live, Neutral and Earth ???

I think what confused me was that I thought that it was Red (Live from switch), Black (Live return to switch) and Earth...

Trust me to over-complicate things!!!

Cheers

Steve

[Sparks]

This is correct!

You have Live, Neutral and earth at your consumer unit (CU), this then runs to a switch, where (at least) the live goes through a switch, then it ends up at the light's L N E terminals.

The actual runs of wire may be slightly more complicated looking, for example, the feed from the CU may run directly to the light, then another wire runs from the light to the switch, more cable is involved this way, but the actual connections are the same. If this is the case, just make sure you connect your new cable to the wires that are connected directly to the original light!

Also, if this is the case, you can then easily add a photocell, or darkness detector!

Then when you forget to turn the lights off, they will at least go off when it is light!

Sparks...